Two Pieces
by lostinwriting23
Summary: In the morning, when she wakes up alone, hungover and momentarily without the memory, it feels like a nightmare. Percy, halfway across the city in the castle, never even managed to go to sleep. He'd gone straight from her house into his old workshop, busying his shaking fingers in the way he knew best and trying to bury the memory of her breaking voice under the hammering of metal.


**I have no idea where this came from but suddenly I wrote this and here it is. I've been thinking about Percy and Vex a lot lately (apparently) and I remembered the actors saying they broke up at one point during the year break and then boom. This happened. So let me know what you think! **

**I hope you're having a lovely week!**

**3 **

**M**

**XXX**

It's been three months without the rest of the Vox Machina when it happens. She doesn't even remember what the fight is about or how it starts but suddenly they're hissing wit and barbs and acid in each other's faces. It's anger born out of fear, so much fear of things that they can't see or control, and suddenly he's walking out the door and her heart is hammering too loud like they're in battle and she hears herself tell him not to come back. He flinches but doesn't turn and she drowns the sick feeling in her chest in more wine than she's had since the day he died.

In the morning, when she wakes up alone, hungover and momentarily without the memory, it feels like a nightmare. Percy, halfway across the city in the castle, never even managed to go to sleep. He'd gone straight from her house into his old workshop, busying his shaking fingers in the way he knew best and trying to bury the memory of her breaking voice under the hammering of metal. Some part of her knows he's there. She tells herself she doesn't care.

There's a day of nothing. No contact. The second day though, as she steps out of her door to pick up some groceries, he's turning the corner of her street. He looks up from a paper in his hands and he freezes, staring at her. She stares back, suddenly stuck to the spot and overcome by several, unique emotions at once. The automatic excitement, followed quickly by sadness, shame, anger and longing. He looks back at her for a fraction longer and she can't read his eyes. Then he turns and hurries off, back the way her came and Vex slinks into her house again, errands forgotten.

It was a huge great experiment, she tells herself, but her walls were too thick. It had been fun, but it was over. He couldn't bear to lift the pick axe for another blow at the mortar and she couldn't blame him. He had his own cracks to plaster over, why should her bother with hers?

She can do the teammate thing, hide behind platonic platitudes, avoid his eyes and pretend it didn't gut her any time he takes a hit in the heat of battle. She can control the urge to be near him, let her fingers fall between his, the urge to kiss that stupid, smug smirk off his face every time he thought he was cleverer than the rest. She can fortify the walls. Knowing how his lips tasted, how his hands felt on her body, the perfect little noises he made in his sleep, the way he had looked at her, in their bed, sated and soft and, for once, at peace? Immaterial. She can handle it.

She makes it almost three weeks. She doesn't see him for that entire time, even though they're in the same town. It's one of the most miserable almost-months of her life. Her brother is off, across the country, happy and in love (and yes, yes, good for him, she's happy for him and she loves Keyleth and all the supportive sister things she's supposed to feel but, Gods above, she _misses him so deeply _and wants nothing more than a hug from him, even if it's followed by an "I told you so.")Pike and Grog are doing whatever it is they do, mostly just yelling "Monstah!" at each other. Tary is around but she starts to avoid him once he asks about where Percy is. It's not something she can bring herself to talk about, even to him.

Life is busy and she keeps herself that way, checking in with Syngorn, training the Grey Hunters, doing her duty as a baroness (whatever the hell that means). She knows his patterns by now, as he knows hers and she avoids hotspots for him (though there aren't many) or sneaks her way through if it's the only option. She doesn't want to see him but when she does go out, she imagines he's everywhere and it makes her heart roll every time. Someone's hair, an accent, flashing blue eyes, a long coat, it doesn't even have to be the right color. Trinket is never far, leaning into her legs when she gets too caught up, and moaning until she relents with a soft smile and kneels to give him belly rubs. He hasn't seen Percy in a long time and Vex is sad. He doesn't understand what's happening.

But then, one frigid night, she wakes up, trembling and sobbing. Trinket raises his head as she tumbles out of bed, scrambling for her bow, and backing herself into a corner as she tries to sort through mess and noise in her head to find her way back to what really happened, what is true. She runs numb fingers against "Sinneath," over and over again, trying to remind herself that if her dream were real, the words would disappear and the fear that they will do just that is what keeps bringing her back to them. Trinket watches her in concern for a moment before galloping his way out the door and Vex has never felt so bloody alone in her life.

XXX

Percy is found by one of the castle guards, down in his workshop, tinkering with the gods only know what. His hands are flying, his brain is in blinders and he's definitely not exhausted beyond belief.

"Sir," the young guard taps her fist rather intently on his door, until he sets his tools down and steps away from his work bench, "Apologies for interruptin', s'just, that bear's outside."

"Bear?" He mutters, doing everything in his power to concentrate on the young woman in front of him.

"Yes sir, the bear what runs 'round with Lady Vex'ahlia-"

"Trinket?" Percy's mind snaps like a rubber band, everything coming sharply back into focus and he takes off for the gates of the castle, shedding his workshop apron and gloves as he goes.

Trinket is pacing up and down in front of several more guards when Percy gets there but he pushes past them and runs up to the bear. At the sight of him, Trinket lets out a plaintive moan and lopes up to butt his head into Percy's hand.

"Trinket, is Vex-"

At the mention of his mother's name, the bear looks up into Percy's face for a half second before taking off back down the road to town, full tilt. Something like ice settles in Percy's chest and he shoots off after him, cursing the fact that both of his guns are locked up in their cabinet back in the castle.

Trinket noses his way through the ajar back doors of Vex's house, Percy right on his tail.

"Vex?" He calls, trying not to sounds as frantic as he feels, _Is it Hotis? Is it something with her brother? Some new, unknown horror? _"Vex please tell me you're alright. Vex!" Trinket leads up the stairs and Percy slides his way past the bear and stumbles his way toward her room. As he nears the door, he can hear the telltale hitch in Vex's unsteady breathing and flashes back to the nightmares he'd been around for in the past. He curses under his breath but slides around the corner of the door and does a quick scan of the room. Empty and just as he remembered it until he sees-

She's crouched on the ground near the corner, Fenthras in a white-knuckle grasp in one hand, her quiver clutched in the other. She's trembling, gritting her teeth and her cheeks are wet with tears. Her braid is loose over her shoulders and her eyes are a little wild, like a deer in the forest.

"Oh Vex," He murmurs, stooping a little to try to catch her attention but he needn't try. The moment he'd come in the room, her eyes had been locked on him. Because if he was here, her dream wasn't true. She hadn't taken Saundor's offer, she hadn't betrayed the people she loved most, hadn't watched them ripped away with tentacle-like vines, hadn't stood by passively as Saundor slowly suffocated them within his branches, "For their own protection." She hadn't returned to Whitestone with lies on her tongue and ichor in her veins and false promises of a monster's love. It wasn't real. This had to be real, right?

"Percy," she hiccups, "Percy, can you take these away from me please?" she's trembling but she holds out the bow and arrows. He obliges almost eagerly, darting forward and wresting them from her trembling fingers, hiding them back in her usual space under the bed and turning back just in time for her to launch herself into his arm. He catches her with ease and tries to ignore the strain in his heart as she clutches on to him. He responds as much as he dares let himself which probably isn't enough for her and certainly isn't as much as he wants.

"We left the Feywild. We defeated Saundor. All of us. Together," She mouths the words out, barely voiced, against his shoulder and his heart jerks painfully again.

"Yes, Vex, we did. Saundor was destroyed."

"Good." She takes great gulping breaths of air and he supports her upright, silently counting every second to himself so he knows exactly how long her got to hold her again. Slowly, her breathing returns to normal and her shaking stills an amount. But she doesn't move away.

"Vex. Darling, are you back with us?"

She laughs wetly and won't bring her face away from his shoulder, "Don't call me darling, darling. I don't think I'll be able to let go." Her voice is brittle and high in a way he recognizes from before they made their way into Syngorn.

His mouth goes dry, something hot slides down his throat and his arms flex around her minutely, "Nonsense, darling," it's habit and it comes out so easily and _she's in his arms again_, "You always had the better self control of the two of us."

"Percy," She whimpers, scrunching her hands into fists in his sleeves and releasing several times.

"I don't particularly like the idea of you letting go, darling and if this is all I ever get to hold you again, I'll do whatever I can to keep you near as long as I can."

"I don't particularly like the idea of you going anywhere," Her voice cracks and Percy slips his fingers into her hair around her braid.

"That was a fake, 'don't come back,' then?" He barely dares to hope as he whispers it out into her hair and she shudders a little.

"I barely remember saying it. Words of a scared woman."

"Doesn't change what we fought about."

"We'll work it out. If you want to." She tenses in his arms but he's done being away from her and he holds her closer.

"It would be a privilege."

She almost sags in relief, "You sure about that?"

"Positively certain. My workshop has seen quite enough of my moping and I have not heard nearly enough of your voice. It would be an honor to be around as long as you'll have me."

She tucks her face under his chin, "Shall we start with tonight?"

"Yes. Tonight."

She finally pulls back to look into his face and the tips of his fingers, still a little sooty and rough, catch a tear that slides down the slope of her long nose.

"And after?"

"As I said. As long as you'll have me."

Vex's lip trembles and Percy presses his forehead against hers. He knows she hates showing weakness, even if he doesn't see it that way, even though he's told her it's okay. He satisfies himself by being close enough that she knows he can't see her properly. It will make her feel better. Baby steps.

"I've missed you." He says it first so she doesn't have to. It's a push and a pull.

She nods against his forehead, swiping at another tear before bringing still damp fingers to rest on the side of his face, "So, so much, dear."

"I'm sorry-"

"No, don't. I'm sorry, it was-"

"Completely my fault and we-"

"Percy, no-"

"Yes, and I hate that I just walked away without-"

"I told you to. And I hate that," The tips of her fingers rest on his lips and he falls silent, "I could just as easily have come to you. And I didn't. And I'm sorry."

She rotates her head down and presses an uncharacteristically gentle kiss to his lips. They both gasp at the contact, after days and weeks of being so distant. Two puzzles pieces falling back together and they're both breathless with the glory of it.


End file.
